Agriculture in the news - January 27

27 January 2012

A round up of farming news from across the UK and the world.

Beef and milk sectors lead English income rise

ALTHOUGH estimated Scottish farm income figures are not due to be released until next week, comparative figures from England published yesterday show substantial rises, particularly in the beef and milk sectors.

According to the estimated figures from Defra’s farm business unit for the 12 months to the end of February 2012, dairy farmers are predicted to see a 27 per cent increase in incomes. Grazing livestock farms should also see incomes improve, with a 30 per cent rise expected for lowland units, but incomes on upland farms will have a more modest 7 per cent rise.

Ireland has enjoyed high cereal yields over the last decade, with the highest average wheat and second highest average barley yields in the world, according to Teagasc research.

Teagasc head of crops science John Spink told those attending the Teagasc National Tillage Conference in Kilkenny that 2011 produced some of the highest yields on record, with an average increase of 13% on 2010 yields. This result was particularly surprising, given the record years that preceded.

Simon Coveney TD, Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, welcomed European Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development, Dacian Ciolos, to Dublin last week, and impressed upon the Commissioner the key CAP reform priorities for Ireland following the publication last October by the Commissioner of his legislative proposals for the period 2014 to 2020.

A Biblical scene met Northern Ireland farmer Gordon Flinn after a lorry overturned into his field, spilling tonnes of fish.The ‘fish farm’ accident caused an overnight internet sensation this week, as a photo taken by Mr Flinn’s daughter Louise went viral.“It was like a catastrophe, as though the fish had fallen out of the sky,” the civil servant said today.

ENGLAND’S landed estates have contributed a huge amount to the country’s prosperity and the physical appearance of our landscape, but in the last 100 years many of those estates have been sold and broken up, with some of them replaced by motorways, supermarkets, power stations, airports or housing. Many a motorist has stopped for a coffee at a motorway service station without realising that the tarmac on which they’ve parked was once the site of a sweeping drive leading to a graceful country house and parkland.

Cows can count on more comfort in their cubicles thanks to a farm supplies company in Co Antrim. Northern Farm Supplies in Toomebridge designed a new ‘flat pack’ cubicle for cows which is already in use on farms in Northern Ireland.